Takeda releases new single “Lion’s Den”

Takeda’s story begins in rural England, where Josh Harrison spent his formative years in an isolated town before escaping in Spring 2022 with a catalogue of songs and the beginnings of a musical identity. Recruiting Charlie Wilson on drums and David Woodgett on bass, Josh transformed those songs into something heavier, louder and more expansive and with Ollie Welch later joining for the live stage, Takeda arrived as a band that could blend folk intricacy, grunge fuzz, passionate vocals and an acoustic guitar pushed to seemingly impossible extremes.

Unveiling their sound in 2023 with the debut double single “Pulling Teeth / Fall Asleep,” they returned last year with new material in the build up to their first full-length record, In Venus’ Train. The band’s sound has always been instilled with unlikely pairings; British folk revivalists Fairport Convention sit alongside alternative metal giants TOOL in their influences, while the melodic and emotional stylings of folk is fused with the noise, fuzz and distorted guitar tones of grunge. Their music has been likened to the imagined meeting point between Ben Howard and Pile, though even that comparison only sketches the edges of what Takeda are attempting.

At the centre of it is an acoustic guitar, not softened or tucked behind the heavier elements but placed directly in the firing line. Josh’s fingerpicking, influenced by Bert Jansch, forms an intricate setting before being confronted by crushing riffs, fuzz-drenched guitars and heavy breakdowns. British and American folk techniques collide with rock and grunge, creating music that’s energising and fiercely original. Josh describes a band hungry to sound like nobody but themselves, explaining that when a song can be firmly connected to another artist’s music, Takeda often lose interest in it, resulting a musical output driven by avoiding the obvious route.

Now the Norwich folk grunge pioneers return with “Lion’s Den,” a brand new single which lands as the first taste of their forthcoming siphomore studio album, set to land next year via Drongo Records. It’s their most visceral single yet, taking the musical collision that’s defined Takeda since their formation and bringing its emotional impact further into the foreground. Yet the noise is only part of the story, as Josh’s years spent in a doomsday cult have profoundly shaped Takeda’s imagery and songwriting. The band’s debut album chronicled the painful process of breaking away from that past but “Lion’s Den” moves into the aftermath, confronting the anger, resentment, manipulation and betrayal left behind once escape has been achieved.

Produced by David Pye, whose credits includes Shaking Hand, Szun Waves, Trudy & the Romance, Faithless and Dido, “Lion’s Den” channels that unresolved emotional weight into one of Takeda’s most direct recordings. Additional vocals from Raya Mhari-Iglesias of Birdwitch add another voice to a track already built around confrontation and intensity. Set up by delicately plucked notes, the rustle of shuffling drums brings a lilting rhythmic sway as smooth vocals glide in to stitch emotive melodic threads intot he folk rock fabric.

Flowing with intricate swells of energy, the chorus rises with lightly gritty instrumentation and impassioned vocals which ring out above, delivering an epic display of the band’s memorable and highly unique sound. Progressing through a dreamy breakdown where fluttering vocalisations hover above pattering percussion, the bite of twanging guitar lines ushers in a gripping switch up where metal-inflected riffs and pounding drums set up a riveting finale.

With “Lion’s Den,” Takeda are not revisiting the past so much as staring directly at what it left behind. Their UK dates throughout September and October will bring that confrontation to the stage, as the band continues towards its second album and another chapter in a story that’s always been about breaking away and finding a sound unlike any other.

Commenting on the release, frontman Josh Harrison offers, “I’ve never written a song in anger before. But Lion’s Den came to me slowly and bubbling up in me. Untangling it as I wrote it was like opening the tap on some pressurised anger in me. The betrayal and manipulation, the resentment I’d kept bundled and caged up disguised as shame. This song became the release for all of that, and letting it out into the world feels very therapeutic.”

Listen to Lion’s Den below

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